Worlds
by MidnightInDecember
Summary: A love like the one Itachi held for Sasuke couldn't just be dismissed; it might impact worlds, it might stop a war. It might kill them all.   Moreover, it could destroy friendships.   ItaShi.


Um... so yeah, this is kind of long.

**Also, as much as I do hate fillers, Itachi in cat ears is luuuuuv ~3**

**...moving on. Do enjoy! (and I sure hope it's not too confusing ^^)**

* * *

**Worlds**

_Don't let go. _

He won't let go.

He is destroying me.

I find it very strange, how bad it hurts; just a moment ago I couldn't feel anything. I was thinking: _yes, it's finally ending, I'm fading, this is good... what a relief_. It contradicted my whole persona, but for once I was satisfied with escaping.

I'm drowning...

I cannot see him, cannot hear him through the water, but only from his hands, firmly secured around my neck, I can tell: he is crying.

Though he seldom did it, I, if anyone, should recognize the telltale signs. Those small, desperate sobs, coming in between broken breaths, as if he's on the verge of hyperventilating...those eyes, all of a sudden too big for his face, the eyes of a child who has been hurt by the creators of its world. They, that usually have no color, just the blackness, and lately have been so utterly devoid of warmth, come to life. The tears give them a glittering clarity and turn them a sad shade of gray, like when the skies are crying.

And then, there are the shivers. They are slow, almost deliberately so: like he is controlling his own losing of composure.

I cannot hear his sobs, cannot see his eyes, but yes, that fine, fine shaking of his slender hands... it betrays him.

It's not just the effort of keeping me under the surface – in fact, he is holding me down with ease that would have shamed me, had I not been so busy with dying –; no, I can tell. Though the pain has enslaved me, despite it encompassing me like the darkness of this night and my body beginning to give out from the pressure, my mind begging to give out from the painful lack of air, I have a most curious realization.

It pains him to break me.

But he's shattering my world.

* * *

Uchiha Shisui wakes up to his precious baby cousin crying.

At first, he doesn't understand why he awoke. He slowly, groggily shakes his head, puts his hands to his eyes to rub the sleep from them, though he still can't see anything through the heavy darkness. He yawns.

And then, it comes again. That sound. That shrill, oddly abandoned, heartbreakingly lonely sound. His first thought is the irrational and somewhat amusing: _How could a hurt animal stray into my bedroom?_

Because that is what it sounds like: it doesn't contain words or reason, only the kind of overwhelming pain that has you losing an own self.

It's not...human.

But when it is repeated again, it strikes him. Yes, he's heard it before. Not often, but enough times. It's just... it feels like so long.

He is eleven years old and Itachi's nine, and still, it was years since last his little cousin cried.

Because apparently, geniuses always have their share of emotional issues.

He gets up from the futon – his eyes have adjusted now, as quick as is expected of a creature of the night – and makes his way over to the still, whimpering lump that is his best friend.

Carefully, he sits down beside him, trying to remember what he used to say back when he had to comfort Itachi almost every other night, trying and failing to swallow down that strange irritation at having his good night's sleep ruined.

They're too old now, after all.

"Did you have a bad dream?" he asks, quietly, afraid to disturb the darkness, the things living in it.

His friend stirs, and then turns abruptly to face him. His shoulders weren't shaking, the only thing telling of his crying was those regularly repeated sobs, and yes, even at this young age he's like that, there is a structure to his tears. Now, their breathing – one ragged, one even – is the only audible thing there is, aside from Shisui's heart which is beating against his temples like the fluttering wings of a caged bird.

"Yes," comes Itachi's reply, in a voice that is calmer than the situation suggests and as always, much older than his years. "I dreamed."

That is all, like he has no need to specify.

Of course he has. One always has.

Shisui lays one hand against that ice cold cheek and feels the warm wetness on the skin, like that time with that man who bled all over him because he couldn't think to move out of the way when the body fell, already a corpse before hitting the ground, even before dragging an uncomprehending child down with him.

It makes him ill, to think about it. He can still feel it, that bitter taste signifying a leaking of life which exploded on his tongue sickeningly, suffocatingly strong, he didn't close his mouth before the man had this chance to sneak death into him, to defile him. Shisui vaguely remembers his savior, promising safety, while all he could do when finally freed was stand on all fours vomiting his guts out.

This is now. This is now. He licks the liquid from his fingers just to convince himself it's salt, not metal.

"What did you dream?" he asks, feeling the exhaustion behind his eyes like a really bad headache.

Like that nausea from years back.

"I don't want to talk about it," Itachi says, and it's almost whiny, revealing a childishness he rarely shows.

"Tell me," Shisui demands. "I don't care if you don't wanna; you're gonna."

Too tired to show anything but selfish anger, but too smart not to realize that if his cousin does not speak now, an incident like this will most likely occur again.

Probably this night, too. Best to get it over with.

He thinks so coldly, he too beyond his age, bitterer than his years, but he has this aching sensation in his heart and he knows that it is love. And because Itachi knows this too, all of it, he soon gives in.

"In my dream," he whispers, and now he sounds haunted, cornered, "everything was cold." He gasps like he can actually feel it, or maybe he is on the verge of new tears. "It was so cold, _so cold_ it hurt to touch. And I don't know... I don't know why, but I wanted so badly... to touch something..." He sniffs silently. "I don't understand."

There is something very sad about the way he says this, as if he should understand. Like there is something he would have had, had it not been stolen from him. Because innocence isn't only ignorance, but awareness too; and this knowledge cannot be recreated, for once dead, it's as final as the ending of a human life.

Like a virginity of the mind.

"I don't, either," Shisui says and hugs his friend tightly, and it is all he can do not to cry himself.

They cling to each other like the helpless children they are, and the older of them rocks his younger relative to sleep, like he used to do so many years ago when the world was still on fire.

* * *

_They ran. _

_Shisui will later have it explained to him, why the roof of their shelter had collapsed; that Suna knew what to target, that they had never cared for if what they killed actually posed a threat. That it was a warning, a cruel 'look what we can do', demonstrated in the unbelievable amount of innocent casualities. _

_A simple act meant to weaken the moral of the enemy, cruel beyond the comprehension of adults, way over the head of a war victimized child._

_They had fallen Konoha in the back, breaking open so many shelters after having left the guards dead, or dying – the jonin were out there on the front lines; and those that were left couldn't handle the concentrated assault of a village as powerful as Suna – and slaying children, elders, civilians, former shinobi, now incapacitated, with a monstrous ease, in the blink of an eye. _

_And when the world fell apart like broken glass all around them, six year old Shisui had grabbed his four year old cousin by the hand, bent down to whisper an instruction in his ear (don't let go) and after that, they had ran. _

_As fast as their short legs could carry them, longer than either of them actually felt able to. They hadn't stopped running until they couldn't see Konoha anymore, and a bit farther still._

_Shisui didn't know where he was going. He was long past the point where he cared, and they had gone too long a way to recognize anything around them. All he knew was that their aim was for safety, but nothing was safe; the place that temporarily had provided protection had cracked open like an eggshell, leaving them all vulnerably exposed to the bluest of all blue skies. _

_It was spring and everywhere around them, the nature was coming to life. He probably shouldn't have left town, but there, fights had blossomed up after the attack by Suna – they had taken it the closest to home you could get, into Konohagakure's very heart, vulnerably bleeding – and explosions had had the ground shaking in a pretend earthquake, the falling fragments from surrounding houses the only rain that would be seen this beautiful, sunny day. _

_At first he had led them away from where he knew the battlefield to be, knew from the adults pointing and prohibiting; in the direction of the mountainside that displayed the faces of the Hokages, as he had meant to hide in the forest at its foot. But they didn't get the chance to reach it. In a split second, they were both thrown to the ground, knocked over as if they'd been made of paper, while a devastating roar left Shisui momentarily deaf and too giddy to even begin to grasp what was happening. _

_His only clear apprehension was that of a small hand clasped in his, of a small body shaking where it lay, pinned underneath him. _

_He knew his cousin was crying – he thought he might be, himself – but he couldn't hear Itachi sobbing, he couldn't even hear his own breathless, terrified gasps. _

_It was a sudden shock wave that had swept them of their feet; when this realization dawned on him, Shisui hurried to his feet, wobbly trying to pull his smaller relative up with him. When they both stood he turned and started dragging Itachi along after him, half staggering, half running down a narrow side street, away from the thick smoke that was the only thing he had seen of what must have been quite the explosion. _

_And then they had been running until exhaustion caught up with them, they'd reached the forest from a part of the village he didn't know and gone quite a bit in between the trees. From where they were right now he couldn't even see the mountain; the forest was too tall and dense. _

_Maybe he should climb a tree. _

_Itachi looked up at him, seriously, calmly; their hands were still linked, he hadn't let go. _

_They had stopped here mere minutes ago, confused and lost. Since then, here they'd stood, both too tired to speak, too drained to cry. For the first time, Shisui noticed that his cousin had a small cut over his eyebrow, probably from the fall, which had left blood splattered all over his pale, dirt streaked face. _

_He bent down by the apathetic Itachi and rubbed his thumb over the wound. Itachi made a pained sound, but otherwise did not react in any way. _

_Shisui looked at the blood on his fingertip, and then was surprised to discover that his legs was giving up beneath him; he fell down ungracefully and hit the ground like a thrown doll, and realized that somewhere during those moments, he had burst into tears. _

_He hugged his knees to his chest and cried and cried and cried, because no, it couldn't hurt this much, shouldn't feel this wrong, and while he heaved with sobs that left him just a little bit emptier he lost track of time, if that was a suiting saying when he hadn't known to begin with. _

_A thin finger poked his forehead, a cold, bloodied, dirtied finger that felt like death, breathing against his skin. Shisui knew who it was because they were alone out here, they were alone – oh god he hoped they were alone – and there was something in the simplicity of the touch that he recognized. _

_When he looked up at his cousin and did his best to manage a smile, Itachi returned his gaze very solemnly, a short figure standing prouder than the older of them. There was something odd about his eyes. _

_They should be crying, too. _

"_Will it heal?" Itachi asked in a small voice and absentmindedly fingered the cut above his eye, as if he wasn't bothered by it. _

_Like he couldn't feel. _

"_O-of course it will," Shisui sniffed weakly, pulling his little friend down into a tight hug because he was cold, he was freezing, they both were, they could die here. _

"_It will?" Itachi mumbled stubbornly, his breath tickling Shisui's ear. "Are you sure?"_

_He was soft and warm, his presence was comforting, he was something to hold on to, but there was the question in his tone, that thing with the wound. Like it wasn't what he had asked about. _

_'Maybe he meant the world,' Shisui thought stupidly, and knew that if that had been the question, his answer would have been a lie. _

* * *

"Remember when you said you wanted to marry me?"

Shisui grins at Itachi, who pointedly ignores him. Like he always does. It's something to do with that dignity of his, as impeccable as it's untouchable.

They are sitting down by the water, the place where they usually go when they want to be alone. Their place, or some sort of the same stupid shit. No matter, dumb as it may be; simply thinking it has Shisui smiling to himself.

Because out there in the real world, the times are turbulent. People are changing, and they might be, too. It's even possible they are drifting apart. But not here, this is their sanctuary, their safe haven. This is where you run.

That is why Itachi's here today. He doesn't say – doesn't need to – but Shisui can tell. When the pressure from those who want the perfect prodigy to rise to greater heights (because no, _perfect_ is never good enough) becomes too great, he flees here, to his last resort. If he wants to preserve his spotless reputation, and remain the honor of his clan and the pride of their family, this is were he has to go. Take a break from himself so that he can come back, rested, and prove himself more useful than ever.

It's a vicious cycle, like love breeding hatred breeding vengeance. It's the darkness of a clan such as theirs, with all the narrow mindedness and overconfidence of a group which looks only to itself, born from years and years of forced isolation, that has fed self-pity and self-righteousness until they transformed into murderous intentions.

Ah, Shisui knows this. He has seen.

He is fourteen and his cousin is twelve: rightfully, they shouldn't need to worry about such things, they should be following orders blissfully, but then, this is how it's always been. Its the prize you pay for being a prodigy; they're both too damn good for their own bests.

He is the one with the flash step and the self-developed mind control, and Itachi, well, he is just _that _skillful.

Right now, they both are taking a break.

"Hey, 'Tachi!" Shisui pokes his friend on the shoulder and flashes him a smile, because this day is too great a day to not spend happy. "I'm talking to you!"

The sun is shining from a light blue, cloudless sky and it is summer, one of those summer days which will live on in your memories as flawless. The breeze is refreshing, a soft touch to your skin that helps to stave off the suffocating warmth that otherwise would have been. It has with it a mild, sweet smell of summer flowers that are blooming in explosions of color all around them.

They are seated at the riverbank, underneath an old, majestic tree painting the ground with moving shadows, both with their backs against the thick trunk. Shisui has his legs stretched out in front of him, while his friend sits with folded legs and still looks every bit the alert warrior, even in the midst of all this lively greenery.

Just to contradict that thought, Itachi allows himself a small smile while he lets his eyes wander over the river's glittering blue surface; his cousin lazily follows his gaze.

"I know," he says simply.

"So you're telling me those feelings have changed?" Shisui feels utterly relaxed, and from body parts he barely cared he had there is now leaking tension he hadn't a clue existed. "Because you were oh so adorable when you were six years old and gave me those pretty pink flowers..."

Itachi merely looks at him with fond indulgence and says nothing, even when his smile finally reaches his often so lifeless, ever so black eyes. There is something otherworldly beautiful in the fragility of his rare joy, about his pale skin that is stained with shadows like dark bruises, created by the branches overhead, swaying in the wind.

"I know you kept them," Itachi answers cooly. "You dried them and hung them up and you got really upset when I threw them away."

"That was because they were _my_ flowers," Shisui defends himself. "You have no right to get rid of other people's shit."

"My flowers weren't shit," Itachi says seriously.

If Shisui didn't know better, he'd say he sounds hurt. Luckily for both of them, he does, and either way chooses to keep from commenting.

It really is too good a day. He closes his eyes and lets the wind plant her careful kisses on his forehead, for once smoothed out like it should be, on his cheeks, as chalky, sickly white as his little cousin's, the sun be damned. Pretends that it is lips, the gentle sensation of a mouth wordlessly whispering love into his skin.

There is something about this day... and he lets himself dream.

Then, fingers that are surprisingly, startlingly cold ghost over his knuckles, on the hand that he has resting on his knee, for once unprepared and unarmed, carelessly hanging as if he didn't know how to kill. Shisui's eyes shoot open and he sees what he couldn't believe, but what was bound to be there: the fingers which touch is as light and cool as water belong to an unhealthily colorless, all too fragile-looking arm that is none others than his most beloved relatives'.

Actually, Itachi's face isn't as pale as it should be, and it's only upon thinking this that Shisui realizes his friend is blushing. Not only that, but his eyes are downcast, too; even so, the shyness is as easy to catch in his averted gaze as the sheepish and very uncharacteristic grin which lingers almost involuntarily on his face, lightening his features.

Shisui reaches out to streak back a strand of silken hair, and Itachi shivers under his touch like the utter virgin he is - not that this isn't a trait they share.

When it comes to girls Shisui has always been the personification of clumsy and awkward; and he really hates it when they giggle, it grates on his nerves; but this, this comes naturally. With Itachi, it's like he knows what to do, finally. Suddenly it's easy and blood doesn't matter, the clan fades out to insignificance, everyone and everything turns unimportant. Because this is right, this is what should be.

Shisui kisses those bloodless lips as if he's lending some of his own warmth, kisses with an inexperienced mind and a whole new world to explore.

* * *

But that is just a respite.

Before he knows it, the world is crumbling.

It starts with Itachi getting mood swings so unlike him it's really quite scary - it goes along the lines of him thrusting his arms out in universal frustration and cursing the clan and their arrogance, all the while sounding the most arrogant of all - and transforms into a full scale mystery when Itachi not only gets angry with him for, yeah, that's right, _being born_ a fucking Uchiha, but also begins to avoid him with all the bluntness of an asocial freak.

Or maybe that is not how it begun.

For by now, everything is in turmoil. It's that plan of their clan, the whispering in the shadows which he takes part in as much as anybody else, all the while experiencing this most petrifying numbness, as if none of it is real. As if all is as it should, the secret meetings are a part of a newly formed routine, nothing extraordinary, and they happen too seldom to catch his attention.

He doesn't even think of what they are doing, he merely goes along.

Like a brainless soldier, following orders without question.

He wants to talk to somebody but doesn't know what to say. After him mindlessly blabbering to Fugaku on the subject of Itachi and his own – suspicions? - , he is finally ordered, can therefore take action. It's like he no longer knows what to do when he isn't told. They've brainwashed him thoroughly.

The father of the disobedient genius points at his son's leaving back and demands: 'Follow him. Don't let him see you. Report back to me.'

And Shisui happily complies, with all the eagerness of an experienced stalker.

It's not easy, of course. This here is Itachi; it's not bound to be, really, that would've been such a disappointment.

He loses him more times than he actually manages to keep track of him: the boy is nothing but stealth, and fuck, if he isn't quick, too.

It's not that Shisui thinks he's ever seen. It would be a total waste of his immeasurable talent if he allowed himself to get caught red handed, after all. No, it's just that every time they seem to be nearing some sort of breakthrough, when he thinks: 'This is a weird place for you to be, what are you doing here?', when he is almost certain that his (former?) best friend (?) is out to meet with someone, Itachi suddenly gets ultra cautious and then poof, vanishes into thin air.

But not this night.

This night, Itachi moves weirdly. It's not just that he isn't his usual careful self; he is being downright careless. It's almost as if he wants to be discovered.

There is something about him that screams 'stop me'.

They're at the edge of the forest now, Itachi is walking with all the confidence of the innocent, without looking back, not bothering to hide his tracks. The thing is, he never ever walks like this. Even when he's out in some routine errand that nobody gives a shit about, he sneaks, giving off guilty vibes by keeping to the shadows.

Yeah, something's up, no doubt.

Despite Itachi's very convenient attitude change, Shisui almost loses him the moment he is swallowed by the blackness under the ghostlike trees, perhaps due to his own overconfidence, what with his target suddenly being an easy one. Itachi's there, and then, he's disappeared like a mirage, like he's done so often before.

Shisui curses to himself and decides that ok, he'll continue a bit longer, just for good measure: he doesn't expect to actually see him again.

It's not like the resignation has him any less unnoticeable, he's way too good for that. Therefore, it is in absolute silence he enters the forest, treads the ground as if it was dangerously breakable ice, attention focused on every little sound, the smallest movement.

However, he can't help but let out a minimal gasp of surprise, a little louder than what can be safe,

when he catches Itachi's back moving deeper into the forest right in fucking front of him.

Seriously, what the hell?

This is way too out of character.

Itachi being uncaring or not, the art of playing invisible ninja in the night has Shisui so occupied he barely has the time to think of where they're going. There are branches on the ground he has to avoid stepping on, sounds he has to avoid making. Shadows he has to keep to, and when the thought finally enters his mind, Itachi has already stepped out into a little clearing in the woods.

It's quiet, unnaturally so; as if the animals have sensed something, and are smart enough to stay away. Smarter than he is.

The darkness is deep, pressing – it feels like a physical presence, like it doesn't hide him; it watches him, nothing but eyes and poisonous smiles directed at his back.

'Perhaps this is a trap', Shisui thinks. 'Maybe I'm an idiot, for thinking it this simple'.

That's when the man appears.

Shisui has never seen him before. Well, however easily that can be deduced when he can't see his face due to an orange mask with black patterns covering it, but it feels as if he haven't seen him before, like if he had, he'd know. Because this guy isn't just anyone.

This is the type of man whose presence is as threatening as the darkness, who casts another shadow, a blacker one. Shisui feels him, it's like he's standing next to him, so close they're touching, and yet, there is something about him that appears unreal; he's a phantom, a cursed name whispered in a ghost story, repeated in an unholy mantra.

A nightmare vision that vaporises in contact with sunlight.

He has long black hair, dark clothes – his mask is the one thing that separates him from the night. Else he would vanish, moving like a shadow with the shadows, have you dead before you ever caught a glimpse of him.

He and Itachi speaks quietly. Shisui can't catch what they're saying, but their tones are serious, Itachi's has a – and this might just be his imagination, but hell, he _knows_ the guy – hint of distress to it, something that makes the words echo hollowly.

He has to get closer. Has to hear. Wants to know. Shisui impatiently moves, subconsciously shuffles his feet, because they are crawling now, coming alive, ten thousand bugs moving under his skin until it should burst open in a blood red stream. It itches. Fuck, it _itches_.

Some serious shit is underway here. His finely honed instincts could never be this wrong.

It's cold out here, so cold and dark. It's like he's entered another dimension, a world in which all monsters are born, the cradle of fears.

Suddenly, Itachi turns. Not towards him, thankfully, but away from the other man, indicating their conversation to be over. Already? Shisui sinks deeper into the shadows under the trees, while his best friend takes a few long strides over the glade to escape the man, about to return home.

"Itachi," the man calls, and there's something with him, something ancient and evil, a voice slicing the silence like sharpened steel, leaving the air bleeding. "You must do this."

Itachi looks over his shoulder, bows his head, mumbles under his breath, agreeing. He knows. He must.

What is it he must do?

Then, he starts walking again, swiftly. He reaches the tree line and is shrouded in blackness so completely that once again, Shisui loses sight of him. For a moment, Shisui is torn between the desire to follow his friend - comrade, lover, the only one who has ever caressed him so carefully he felt tears sting his eyes - , soon to transform into something else, and to stay behind to learn more about the man that has to be one of the reasons why.

His curiosity wins, along with his common sense. This new person is an unknown entity; he must be investigated. And somebody who scares Itachi in that way... he has to know more.

So, Shisui decides to stay. He turns back to the shadowy clearing, but a little brighter thanks to the gleaming stars. He blinks. A start shakes his body as he realizes that there is no one there.

His eyes are wide open, searching, searching tirelessly while the panic is coursing through his system, filling his brain with a painful buzzing, but no, he can't see anything. No movement.

The wind has stopped. The world is still.

That's when someone very gently places a hand on his right shoulder.

* * *

"How do you feel?"

Itachi smiles up at him. It's a rare smile, coming from him, the softer kind.

He is nothing but warmth and unveiled skin, lying beneath his lover with his hair spread out around him, black like incredible amounts of spilled blood.

Shisui breathes him in, tastes him, has him at the tip of his tongue, in every fiber of his being. They are connected now, bound to each other.

Still, they know nothing of what the other is planning. His thoughts are as hidden to Itachi as Itachi's are to him.

"I'm fine," he murmurs, only partly honest. "What about you?"

"I...," and Itachi cocks one eyebrow and quiets, thinks about it. "I think I feel... good, for now."

"For now?"

"It is sufficient."

They both fall silent, watching the other, waiting. Shisui isn't really sure of what it is they're waiting for. He doubts he wants to know.

"Meet me tonight, will you?"

Itachi is the one to speak, hesitantly. Like he wants a no. Like he shouldn't ask.

It sounds so unlike him, unceremonious, the whispered words of a lover.

Shisui traces a finger down his cheek, wonders if he will taste salt, was he to bring the fingertip to his mouth. Wonders.

There are a lot of questions in his head, but the only one he asks is this:

"Where?"

And Itachi lowers his gaze, doesn't look at him any longer. Maybe he can't. Soon, they're to leave this world, enter the other one, to be lacerated by reality.

The word is merely a breath, almost inaudible:

"...Nakano..."

* * *

They stand at the riverbank, opposite one another.

Itachi is still dressed in his ANBU gear, though he has removed his mask and put his sword aside. A firm figure in his uniform, intimidating: even if he isn't the taller, Shisui feels small before him, and for the first time ever he finds himself fearing him from the bottom of his heart.

If it doesn't go according to his calculations... if he can't...

It's been quite the busy working day, and that is for them both. Shisui himself is drained. Sure, he _did_ do his best to preserve his power, to use as little as he could without it standing out, but things are unstable now, and he was out in the field all day.

He couldn't make himself give work up, not now. He needed something solid, even if it was just the mere repetition of a tedious routine, of a job he is too good for. No stalking today. He has no need to delve into it any further.

What he found out last night... it's enough. It's sickening.

Itachi gives Shisui a curious glance, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth, eyes suspiciously shiny, undecidedly empty, the glass eyes of a child's worn doll.

And Shisui waits for him to speak first, patient and serene, with his mind set on just as dirty work and his motifs not even close to being as noble.

"Care to take a bathe?" His friend tries to smile again, but this time, it fails, gliding of his mouth syrupy sweet, thoroughly false, dripping from his chin like blood that has been choked on.

Shisui counters with a grin just as deceiving, lying all the same, but being decidedly better at it.

"Why not?" he says and shrugs indifferently. "A little cold now, though."

"Everything grows cold eventually," Itachi mumbles darkly.

"Don't be so depressing, dear," Shisui smirks, doesn't know where it comes from, his sick enjoyment. "Smile. It's a beautiful night."

That's when Itachi steps towards him, all the while looking him in the eye, unflinchingly. Places his hands on his shoulders – Shisui remembers, _another hand at his shoulders, a man whose face he cannot see_ – and one lonely tear slips from the corner of his left eye and draws a straight line down his pale cheek.

And now Shisui doesn't know why he was ever afraid, because it's like his skills were only ever honed for this one moment, were made to serve but one purpose... so when Itachi leans in, brushes his mouth with his own, speaks so he can feel it on his lips, an apologetic: "I have to kill you," Shisui goes inside his mind to whisper: "You already did."

* * *

_Shisui hated Uchiha Sasuke._

_That little drooling imbecile, it couldn't even walk by itself. It mumbled nonsense words and though it understood nothing, it always appeared to be watching him with that most smug look in its stupid eyes. Like it knew. It knew it was winning. _

_It wasn't even cute. It had too little hair and a mouth shaped like an o, with which it made very weird gurgling noises, as if it was choking (He damn well hoped it was). And it was fat, too. _

_It disgusted him. _

_Most of all, Itachi awing at every little movement it made was so annoying. _

_Yes, really, that was all. _

_It's not like he's jealous. Shisui snorted scornfully. Of course not. _

"_Be careful," Itachi said, for Shisui had for some reason found himself holding the thing and damn it, he was being careful. _

_After all, if he dropped it, that would only earn it more of its big brother's precious attention. And it would definitely not have the cousin of them both any more popular (but yes, if Itachi wasn't looking, he'd gladly go outside to throw it in the pond.)._

_Mikoto was standing in the background wiping a plate, silently humming and contently smiling to herself, but nonetheless ready to intervene, was she to suspect that any harm could come to her beloved newborn. _

_It gave Shisui the almost irresistible urge to chuck it out the window. _

"_Be careful," Itachi repeated worriedly. _

_Because really, Shisui was waving Sasuke around as if he intended to test how well a baby flied. No, seriously, he was just standing there, with it safely cradled in his arms. _

"_You take him, then," he snapped and held it out at arm's length. "How sweet of you to trust your best friend," and he laced the words with the heaviest sarcasm he could muster, in all his eight year old pride. _

_Itachi didn't much care about his obviously very hurt feelings, but instead snatched the thing away with great enthusiasm and an irritated: "Don't do that!"_

_He looked at his cousin with unconcealed contempt, before shifting his gaze to the boy in his arms, at which point his eyes filled up with a nearly deranged love, the size of worship. _

_That, more than anything, was a hit in the face. _

"_I hate you!" Shisui yelled at the top of his lungs. "You and that annoying, ugly, drooling thing!"_

_And thus, their first ever argument had begun – and ended, because after having uttered those words of truth, the older cousin turned his back on Itachi and his much too shocked expression, on Mikoto who was frowning disapprovingly, and on the baby, which gurgled with a diabolic happiness at his leaving. _

_He ran away without knowing where to, and therefore ended up at the place he subconsciously chose; at the riverbank, before the mighty Nakano, eater of children. _

_Of course. This is where you run. This is where you run. _

_Shisui chewed his lip as if that would help hold back the tears and felt restless, felt worthless and lost and _dumb_. What should he do? Where should he go? _

_He stayed. _

_He stayed there until darkness fell, waiting for someone to come pick him up. They were supposed to, they must, if they cared. They had to actually show that they missed him, or he might as well jump in and drown himself then and there. _

_No one came, but Shisui didn't jump. He cried a little – longer than he was ready to admit – and then walked aimlessly along the riverbank, decided to climb a tree, ended up falling down, and cried a little more. Because it was unfair. Damn, it's so unfair!_

_As hours passed and the feelings subsided, as he watched the light being drained from the sky and the darkness spreading like blood leaking into water, he realized that no, no one was going to come for him. _

_So finally, when he'd swallowed his pride and the air had gotten a slight tinge of cold to it, he rose to go home. He was wearing the typical Uchiha shirt – and a short sleeved one, at that – and it was proving to be quite useless when the temperature was dropping; he vainly hugged himself to try to preserve some kind of body heat. _

"_Hi."_

_The sudden sound had him so frightened he yelped and staggered backwards, just barely managing to stay at his feet. _

_But then, he'd never quite liked the dark. _

_When his heart rate had slowed to a less panicky pace, he'd long since realized he knew that voice. He focused, his eyes as adjusted as they get. Sure enough, there was his best friend, standing no more than five meters away, a faceless yet recognizable shape against the darkening evening sky. _

"_Itachi!" Shisui said, relieved, his voice quivering. "I-it's you..." _

"_It's almost night," Itachi noted quietly, sounding like a parent, he always did._

_So small, but still, he always acted the older of them. _

_This was the part where Shisui usually proved that statement right, either by throwing a tantrum or running away, but at the moment, he was way too tired. So instead, he chose the slightly more appealing option of going home together with Itachi._

_When Shisui got close enough, they locked hands, intertwining their fingers – and then they walked side by side, none of them speaking. Not until they had reached the Uchiha compound, the crossroad where they were supposed to part ways, Itachi finally broke the silence. _

_He knew._

"_This changes nothing," he said, and smiled in the warm, yellow light of the paper lanterns. "I love you, Shisui-san."_

_Now, his eyes were childlike, how they should have been, had he been a normal six year old: big with sincerity and promise, holding nothing but the certainty of the ignorant. _

"_I love you too," Shisui sniffed, feeling the tears rising again, that familiar burn behind his eyes. _

_But both of them knew that this had changed something, that a love like the one Itachi held for Sasuke couldn't just be dismissed; it might impact worlds, it might stop a war. _

_It might kill them all. _

_Moreover, it could destroy friendships. _

_The next morning, Itachi brought him flowers. _

* * *

He kills his family.

Itachi never actually thought that he could do it, and he still doesn't believe it until he stands there, blood on his hands his sword the scattered kunais his hands his hands his hands.

He breathes in the smell of death, of countless dead (no he has counted them all he knows them he knew them) of his own decomposing heart, dying in his chest.

If it is even there, since he killed Shisui. His skin was torn like paper, ribcage ripped open, his heart was thrown into the river, it drowned there. He's already dead.

They both are.

When he has talked to Sasuke and said all he needed to say, lied and deceived and betrayed with his little brother's best foremost on his mind – at least that is what he tells himself, it's for the best had to be done I had to be the one to do it – when he has cried those silent tears, the last ones he'll ever shed, he turns to Madara and says:

"Can I have a moment?"

And his teacher merely smiles, perhaps a little triumphant, but otherwise completely devoid of emotion. Allows him with a gesture, _go_.

Itachi goes.

He goes to the riverside, to that mass of water in which he drowned less than twenty four hours ago. He needs only this pause, before he is to move on, unaffected. A new Itachi will be born from the genocide, stepping out of the blood which lies knee high and devastatingly dark, thicker than madness.

Right now, he is in between this rebirth and his untimely death; this is the intermission, the calm after the storm.

He needs to breathe, _breathe_, tells this to himself as if he's in need of an explanation.

A reason to the 'Why are you here?', just another one among the numerous whys, no doubt the easiest to answer.

His little brother... he must never know. Mustn't see beyond the deception, past the emotionless slaughterer, the remorseless mass murderer. Itachi fears that if something like this, the – cruel unspeakable truth the dark secret the unbreakable curse of this world's self fed hatred what do you call it does it have a name? - was to be revealed to the vulnerable, sheltered Sasuke, would he have his reality torn apart not just once, but twice, that he would lose his mind.

Ah, and he would be excused for it, too.

Maybe he already has. Itachi hopes that his was the right way, that his little brother will be strengthened, not broken.

While he gazes out into a darkness he has learned to see through, he fingers his lips absentmindedly. He doesn't know why, really, but it might be that he recalls being kissed. His eyes slip shut and a small sigh escape him, the only outer sign of him being affected by standing here, remembering _him_.

Itachi knows that it is selfish, but no death hurt as much as Shisui's. When he had commited that crime, there was no longer anything holding him back; he couldn't think better of himself anymore.

He was angry with his father; it helped. He was never very close to his mother, and he blesses it now, the fact that she cared more for her other son, the fact that he never did get too close to people.

As if it wasn't hard, but it was, it was, he feels it rising like nausea, just thinking that way has him hating himself with furious intensity.

And the others? When he had gained momentum, he kept on running – that's what it was like, they were just steps on the way, no matter how cold it sounds, what a monster it makes him. They were the easier of the hardest tasks in his entire, all too short, thirteen years of life.

Each carved a separate picture into his memory, left a blood smeared hand print on his chest, over the place where it should have been, his hurting heart.

A greater purpose... justifying means...

That's when somebody says his name.

First, Itachi thinks it must be Madara, coming to get him. Who else would it be?

Strange though, it didn't sound like his voice.

Itachi turns around with a sinking feeling in his stomach, because he knows that voice, and he couldn't be hearing it. He feels ashamed, like a child getting caught skipping academy classes.

He knows that voice. How strange, that the owner of it was killed only yesterday.

Shisui looks back at him with a flicker of hurt in his eyes, a pained look on his face, as if it had been physical (maybe it was after all he forced him under the surface held him there until there was no breath no life no anything). Still dressed in his police uniform, simple clothes, the Uchiha crest adorning them, and how Itachi has found himself abhorring that symbol.

He is as pale as a corpse, but he is not dead.

"W-what are you...?" Itachi says, and he has never before stuttered like this, it's almost comical, how unlike him it is.

Apparently, Shisui finds it so, too, because he laughs, and it sounds painful, strained, false; it rings distant and unconvincing.

Then he stops abruptly, cuts it off so cleanly and suddenly that the silence left is deafening.

"I hid and watched you," he says. "Do this."

He says it like that, as if it is two sentences. And Itachi thinks, very somberly: I did this.

Itachi doesn't even flinch, he refuses to look away. He has to, more than play; _be_ this part, perfect his new persona, immediately forget about the hesitation, the surprise, with which he met Shisui in the beginning.

Has to... to kill him again. Can he do that?

"How did you survive?" he asks, and knows the answer the very second his question is uttered.

That flawless manipulation, the infiltration of the mind.

That and the flash step, the reasons why he is so famous.

"Who cares?" Shisui says, almost nonchalantly, before he is returned to his rage, when he remembers: "I watched you kill everyone... everyone... and you did it so perfectly, without effort...you killed everyone..."

There's a question hidden in the last statement. One of the whys. Itachi hates the whys.

"Why didn't you stop me?" he asks and this is absurd, so unreal he can't but smile a little, why was it that he worried about Sasuke?

He himself has already lost his mind.

Shisui seems angrier now, hateful, even, there's a darkness in those eyes that means the breaking of bones, the ending of lives.

"I thought you loved me," he mumbles, smiles ironically, repeats, "I thought you fucking say you loved me."

To this, what can he say?

"I had my reasons," Itachi replies.

He doesn't want for it to sound as if he is excusing himself. He therefore detains from saying anything more.

The water is flowing, a constant sound behind him. After a while, you get so used to it. You don't even hear it anymore. It's like people.

Like killing automatically.

But no, that is not the same, it always leaves you smaller, cutting them is cutting into yourself, you're the one you are destroying, for every life you take there's a little less life in you.

That's why he is dead now, with all the lives he's taken.

It wasn't the Nakano. The blood he's spilled, he's drowned.

"I know your reasons." His best friends says this, and Itachi is affected, once again – he cannot stop this new feeling, which he is fairly sure is surprise, from showing on his face. "Your teacher, hm? He told me. I met with him."

How fairly unexpected.

If Shisui saw something he shouldn't have – and it is highly unlikely he did anything but followed Itachi himself, how else would he have found the elder Uchiha's hiding place? - he would be noticed. Evidently, Itachi missed him, but Madara did not.

And Madara kills with practiced ease; luckily, not all of the blood is on Itachi's hands. So why didn't he kill Shisui? Is it because Itachi had to kill him himself, to gain the Mangekyo?

Only, he failed. However, he has it, his eyes are stronger now. Weaker, too; they hurt. Burn, and bleed.

It seems as if his mere belief that Shisui died was enough. He has been elevated.

Still, why didn't Madara tell Itachi about meeting with his cousin? Why did he tell Shisui the truth? But it's all fun and games for him. Perhaps it is that Madara simply enjoys this, wanted to see how it would play out. Maybe he's even watching now, chuckling with amusement.

He just loves his little puppet shows.

"I can't believe you could," Shisui says, disrupts the thoughts of his almost murderer.

Itachi notes with silent curiosity that whatever he says, he doesn't appear unbelieving.

But it's not acceptance, not that, either. Not yet. Perhaps never.

"Me neither," Itachi says and then he smiles inwardly, he didn't me to say this out loud. "Still... If you know of my reasons, you do understand it was out of necessity, yes?"

His best friend undergoes a transformation with these words. His face twists with disgust, with bitter contempt.

The darkness isn't enough to hide his changed features. Maybe it would have been better, if it were.

"You didn't have to," he snarls venomously, "don't you fucking dare say you did!"

"So you wanted a war?" Itachi replies, calmly.

Though there's an edge to his own voice, too: he is also upset, albeit better at hiding it.

He can't believe they are arguing over this, as if it held importance. All of this... it's too surreal.

"Of course I didn't." Shisui looks confused now, dazzled. Maybe he hadn't thought that far. "But this, fuck, this could have been resolved another way! You are such an idiot, Itachi, really, you are too fucking stupid..."

And he goes on, babbles maniacally, explains all his why not's with a determined, convinced expression. Itachi merely stands there and thinks that he is pretty, his dark curls unruly as always, swept back with an annoyed gesture in the middle of his speech. Those well known features, eyes belonging to a stranger. That body, _now you see me_, flickering out of existence like an extinguished light, but it's only momentarily, that disappearance.

It always is. No wonder he couldn't die.

"I loved you," Itachi interrupts, breaks through that stream of meaningless reasons.

Shisui takes a lonely step backwards, as if he has been hit.

"'Loved?'" and it isn't until his cousin repeats the word that Itachi realizes he was talking in the past tense.

Now, Shisui closes the distance instead – he reaches out to touch Itachi's face, and Itachi has to stop himself from drawing back, fearing (_what_?) the ice cold touch of the dead, the ghostlike fingers to pass through him?

But of course he is solid, warmer than death would have him. There is a heart beating, must be blood pulsing underneath that breakable, touchable skin.

He is real. Itachi feels like he wants to puke.

It's odd, his overly strong reaction. He fights it down, with effort, swallows the bile rising in his throat, he hasn't eaten, thank god he didn't eat today.

The slaughter somehow had him lose his appetite.

"Yeah, of course you can't love me anymore," Shisui mutters childishly, this is nonsense, what is it that he wants? Why does he behave like any of this matters? "You can't love me. You would kill me for those fucking eyes – for power, for self-gain! - but you wouldn't... you wouldn't..."

He needn't finish that sentence. Itachi hears it, the unspoken name.

So, that's what this is about. That is why he is so enraged.

"It isn't about the others," Itachi concludes dryly. "It is Sasuke, right?" A strange smile overtakes his lips, has the corners of his mouth bending upwards, splits his frozen face in two, red flesh revealed, bleeding profusely. "You are jealous. But believe me, my decision to let him live wasn't due to personal preference."

Shisui takes his fingers from Itachi's jawline, where they were resting, insecurely, temporarily. As soon as he does, Itachi misses it. The heat from another body. Something else than the life he has drained all day, with morbid ease, which was falling away like the petals of a withering flower, crumbling under the fingers of its killer.

"Like hell it wasn't." Shisui has been angered again; always the hothead. "You, you love that little freak to death! And I've always _hated_ that... about the two of you..."

"You mean you hid, you saw me kill them all – more, you let me," and Itachi can't stop those words spilling over his lips, "simply so you could see if I would spare Sasuke?"

That is when Shisui hits him. It comes out of nowhere, really, and Itachi has his guard down; the stroke is so hard that it has him stumbling backwards, and before he knows it, the ground has disappeared beneath his feet.

Itachi screams, a short and startled cry, when he loses foothold, because he knows what it is that will catch him, he knows where he was standing at when he fell. He hits the water, sinks beneath it, his back meets the bottom, a stone cuts into his shoulder blade, it must be making him bleed. Blindly he tries to push himself upwards, he attempts to swim; but there is a weight on his chest now and it is keeping him down, down, down.

Shisui.

Just when the blackness starts creeping in, night consuming his world at the edge of his vision, he is let free; Itachi breaks the surface gasping and coughing, and there's a man standing over him, and he knew he would be.

Shisui's face is obscured by shadows, dark paint stroked over his features, making him different, foreign.

Threatening.

"Shisui," Itachi says and his best friend must be looking down at him, he can feel his eyes, piercing.

"Itachi," he replies gently.

And even before his hands are clutched around the younger's neck, Itachi knows what is coming.

It is only fair, after all.

* * *

"_Will it heal?" Itachi asked in a small voice and absentmindedly fingered the cut above his eye, as if he wasn't bothered by it. _

_Like he couldn't feel. _

"_O-of course it will," Shisui sniffed weakly, pulling his little friend down into a tight hug because he was cold, he was freezing, they both were, they could die here. _

"_It will?" Itachi mumbled stubbornly, his breath tickling Shisui's ear. "Are you sure?"_

_He was soft and warm, his presence was comforting, he was something to hold on to, but there was the question in his tone, that thing with the wound. Like it wasn't what he had asked about. _

_'Maybe he meant the world,' Shisui thought stupidly, and knew that if that had been the question, his answer would have been a lie. _

"_It doesn't matter," he whispered, wondering who would find them here, in the middle of nowhere. "It doesn't. The only thing you must remember is," and he gripped those shaking hands hard, hard in his, they felt like ice, "to never let go. Promise me. Never." _

* * *

Itachi lets go.

Shisui very slowly straightens up, soaked; the water has chilled him to the bone, and now it's running from his aching body like silent tears.

And he doesn't know what he just did and he looks down at his hands as if they could explain. And he thinks the man with the mask must be laughing, because this was not, this was something he could have prevented, right?, but he doesn't ponder for long and he truly doesn't care.

This world has split open like a cracked skull and he is standing in the fluids, wading through the leftovers. Dirtied. Soiled.

Insane?

Why didn't he do anything? He could've. He should've saved them. Was he scared? Did he simply not understand? Because it can't have been what Itachi said, not just to see... that would be sick, crazy. Evil. He is not evil.

He is not evil?

He bows his head to Itachi's lifelessness and yes, he cries over his lover's dead body, as if he had the right to mourn.

* * *

**For once, I wanted Shisui to do the drowning. That's basically the idea for this story. I actually finished it quite some time ago, but I've been busy reading through it and waiting for a friend to point out my failed english, so... whatever, here it is. **

**(I'm overusing the word world in this, I am very much aware of that fact XD) **

**This is probably the piece in english that comes closest to my way of writing in my original language... overly wordy, and ridiculously poetic. Still, hope you liked it XD**. **R&R?** **...please.**


End file.
